Tom Brown's SEELEdays
by LVDB
Summary: What happens when a Victorian children's book hero stumbles into the world's most twisted coming-of-age story? Pure crack, of course, but a lot of fun to write.
1. Prologue: Mad Dogs and Englishmen

**Tom Brown's SEELEdays**

**Prologue: Tom**

"I say, Tom...it's getting rather late."

I nodded. It _was_ getting late, and I wasn't sure that the Doctor would believe us a second time if we told him that we got lost during Hare and Hounds. Our rule-breaking during our stay in Lower Fourth had seen to that, if nothing else. Still, I might as well put on a bold front for as long as it lasted.

"Don't worry, East. I'm sure we'll find the scent again in half a minute," I said.

We scanned the forest floor for the soggy bits of paper 'scent', to no avail. If the boys playing Hares had left a trail behind, it had been buried long ago in the mud. At this point, I admit that I was becoming worried. After another half-hour, I gave up the effort and focused instead on finding a dry place to sit down.

"It's like a jungle here," East muttered.

"Cheer up, Scud," I replied. "Besides, didn't you want to join the Company army in India? Just think of it as training for fighting the Mahrattas."

He looked back at me skeptically. I can't say I blamed him.

"Perhaps one of us should climb a tree and get the lay of the land," Tadpole suggested.

"I'll do it," East and I both said simultaneously.

In the end, East prevailed upon me to let him do the honors. As he climbed, I took account of the situation. We were lost in the forest during a rainstorm. The light was failing. We didn't have any food. The safest thing would be to find some dry nook to spend the night rather than blunder about in the dark.

"I can't see a thing!" East called from the treetop.

That settled it.

"Well, Tadpole," I said, slapping him on the back, "it looks like we'll be...my heavens, what's wrong?"

Even in the shadows of the evening forest, I could see that Tadpole's face had paled, and his eyes were bugged out like saucers. For a moment, I thought it was the cold. He raised his hand a few inches and then froze again, as if he was trying to point at something and then thought better of it. I spun around in the direction his half-hearted gesture had been aimed.

It was a terrible feeling, I can tell you. I had no idea what to expect. In that split second, several possibilities raced through my mind, each more implausible than the last. It couldn't be a gamekeeper; some old Velveteens wouldn't have spooked Tadpole so badly. A feral dog? Unlikely. A wild animal? There weren't any dangerous ones near Rugby, as far as I knew. Robbers? Also unlikely, and wouldn't we have heard them ahead of time? Perhaps--?

"East, stay up the tree!" I shouted.

"Eh?"

"Don't move! I don't think it sees you yet."

"What doesn't see me?" he called back. I gritted my teeth and tried to fight the rising panic in my voice.

"Quiet!"

Like the brave little ass he was, East ignored my warning and started climbing down again, shaking leaves and cracking branches in his haste. I rolled my sleeves up and took a few steps toward the apparition watching us from the underbrush.

"Run," I whispered to Tadpole. He nodded, still wide-eyed, but he didn't run either. I couldn't be sure whether it was because he was frozen with fear or because, like Scud, he was too brave for his own good.

_Right, then...distract it_.

I advanced again. The thing watched me with curious, emotionless eyes. They had an intensity that I hadn't seen before, and I soon realized why: they were red and glowing like coals. The specter was definitely human in its general outlines, but it emitted an odd illumination like foxfire. It called to mind the ghost stories I'd heard in the Vale of the White Horse as a child, and the boy who impersonated a spirit by dipping himself in phosphorous. This time, there could be no doubt about the spirit's genuineness. It glided closer, and my tongue caught in my throat. It was hovering several inches above the ground. That wasn't the only thing that shocked me, though. 'It' was obviously female--and naked.

"Tom Brown," it said. "I require your assistance elsewhere."

"Stay away from him!" someone squeaked from behind me. I turned around and realized that it was East. I'd never heard his voice take that pitch before. He looked well enough, though--it was too dark to see him shaking, and if his tone hadn't betrayed him, he might have convinced the specter that he wasn't afraid. Something told me it wouldn't have mattered, though.

The naked young woman never took her eyes off of me.

"I require Tom's assistance," she repeated.

"We'll see about that!" East replied. His voice had recovered a bit by now, and he started searching the ground for something. The apparition ignored him.

I kept one eye on her and looked back at Tadpole, who was still riveted a few feet behind me.

"Run, you idiot!" I hissed.

He didn't move.

"Found one!" East called. Despite the gloom, he'd located a sturdy-looking stick on the forest floor. He swung the weapon above his head a few times like a shillelagh and walked toward us. "Now let's see you take Tom--"

He got no further. Concentric octagons of light flared up in front of Scud East like fiery tree rings. East rebounded from them as if they were a solid wall.

"East!"

I whipped out my pocket knife, cursing myself for not remembering it earlier, and held it up to the specter. It--she--gave me the same bored look that she had earlier.

"That does not appear to be a particularly threatening weapon," she observed. "Do you intend to stab me?"

"Eh? No!" I said. "Old Benjy told me about you creatures. I know you're allergic to iron, so keep away, d'you hear?"

"I am not a fairy," she said. I suddenly found that I couldn't move. It felt like being constricted in an invisible metal suit. She floated over, gently removed the knife from my hand, and tossed it a few feet away.

"Oh..."

"Tom Brown, there is something that I must show you," she said. Without waiting for a response, she touched my temple with her forefinger. I became dimly aware that my body had begun to spasm, but the stream of visions that followed drowned out all other considerations.

I saw huge, monstrous creatures plowing through a city, knocking down impossibly high towers that seemed to be made completely of glass. Metal boxes the size of houses launched impossibly accurate Congreve rockets at an armored giant. Horseless steel carriages raced at impossible speeds along surfaces straighter than any turnpike or macadam road I'd ever seen. They reminded me a bit of locomotives on wheels, except that they didn't spew a stream of black soot. A woman with a red jacket and purple hair -- doubtless the effect of too much silver nitrate -- bled to death in iron hallways of an underground castle. Words in a language I didn't understand babbled at me at a mile a minute. Wait, though--I _did_ understand it. I searched my mind for the language's name. _Nihongo_. Japanese.

"The Hermit Kingdom?" I wondered aloud.

All of this flew by in a second or two. In the pause that followed, I felt as if I'd just crammed for a Greek recitation. Before I could recover, another vision emerged from the gloom.

A boy and girl sat on a beach, staring at a cyclopean white head that must have been several miles in diameter. The waves shone blood-red against a deep blue sky. A spectral girl -- the one who was giving me these visions, I realized -- floated in the air above the crimson sea, watching the two young people with a look that spoke of despair and eternity. I suddenly remembered a quotation from Apuleius that our master had given us for lines: _You will reach the lifeless river over which Charon presides_.

The boy sank into the sand and wept while the girl rubbed her throat. I saw that she was heavily bandaged. She growled something to the boy, about how she only had one night before she had to return. When he didn't answer, she pulled her feet to her chest and stared at the ebbing tide. I recognized the look on her face only too well--it was the look I'd worn when Flashman had roasted me in the fireplace. She was struggling not to cry.

"The shape of things to come," the spectral girl said.

I looked back at Scud, who was still lying unconscious on the ground. In an instant, I knew he would be alright. I also knew that he would join the army as he had promised, and that he would die with a sepoy's bayonet in his back in '59, during the Mutiny. Old Benjy had told me once of the _Taisch_, the power of the Scottish seers to look at men and know the hour and manner of their deaths. I realized now that it wasn't as grand a power as I'd imagined it would be. With some difficulty, I avoided the morbid temptation to glance at Tadpole as well.

"I'll do what I can," I said at last.

She nodded with what I guessed was appreciation.

"Very well."

"But...see here, how do you expect me to do anything? I don't even _understand_ your world."

"Our world," she corrected.

"Yes, very well then; _our_ world. _Our _future. Whatever it is."

She stroked her chin and stared into the distance.

"The memories I have given you will be sufficient. As to the rest...you must trust me."

A horrifying thought struck me.

"Wait a moment! Will I ever see my family and friends again?"

She nodded.

"If you do not die, yes."

That scared me, but there was nothing for it now. I took a deep breath, steeled myself, and did my best to look brave.

"All right. I'm ready to go. Just..."

She cocked her head to one side like a curious basset hound.

"What is it?" she asked.

"Ah...ahem...You _do _wear clothes in the future, don't you?"

She stared at me with a look of equal parts surprise, contempt and indifference. I didn't dare to take my eyes from her face, though. Looking anywhere else would likely be...distracting.

"Perhaps I should have chosen Stalky instead," she muttered at last.

"Who?"

A white light engulfed us, and I felt the Rugby forest fade around me as if I was waking up from a dream. They were slowly replaced by the outline of a seat and cabin a bit like a coach. Before the vision coagulated into solidity, I heard her voice again.

"If you are successful, you will not meet me in this form again. If you will excuse me, I must see Ikari one last time. I think he is waiting by the payphone..."


	2. Cometh the Angel, Cometh the Boy

**Chapter 1: Shinji**

The foreign kid was talking again. I'll admit that he wasn't as talkative as most Europeans are supposed to be, but it was still above my normal comfort level. (Then again, so are most things beyond complete silence). He'd ooh'ed and ah'ed at half the things he saw on our trip...though strangely, he'd treated the Geofront as just another in a series of wonders. The golden light shimmering on the glass of upside-down skyscrapers had been incredible--enough to shake even me out of my usual torpor. He seemed more concerned with the buildings aboveground, and watched them as if he expected them to fall over.

"I think we'll get along quite well, Ikari. I say, d'ye want to play singlestick sometime?"

"What's singlestick?"

"Don't ask," Misato called back. She was sitting at the prow of the boat, talking with with Dr. Akagi as we plowed through an underground sea of pink liquid. Every so often, I thought I could see the gloomy shadows of monstrous limbs in the distance.

The boy explained anyway. "Ah. I suppose you wouldn't know about it here, would you? It's just something we used to play in the Vale of the White Horse. You use wooden cudgels. Trains you for saber fencing."

I sighed with relief, my excuse all ready.

"Sorry, I don't have any Kendo armor. It's pretty expensive."

He gave a sharp, barking laugh.

"_Armor_? How do you expect to judge the winner if both fellows are wearing armor?"

"Umm...how _do_ you expect to pick the winner?"

"Here it comes," Misato muttered.

"Well, you try to cut the other fellow's cheek or forehead until it's bleeding. Technically, you don't win unless it's a full inch of blood, but I don't suppose it would matter much in a friendly match. It's the cut that's the main thing....I say, what's wrong?"

"Isn't that a little dangerous?" I ventured.

"Why, don't be silly. It's the safest thing in the world! Well, unless both contestants start bashing at each other's elbows to deaden the arm. I remember when Willum Smith lost all feeling in his right hand after a bout with the shepherd a year back. .."

He must have caught my expression, since he threw his hands out in what he must have thought was a reassuring gesture. I nearly jumped.

"Don't worry, though. You could wear a heavy coat in the first couple of matches. Not that they ever do that in _London_, but it's good enough for a match in Japan..."

I was discovering that my normal habit of nodding and going along could quickly get me killed.

"Is that how you got that scar on your forehead?" I asked. I'd heard that the indirect approach didn't work as well with foreigners, but I thought that mentioning the potential of scarring would be obvious enough.

"What, you mean in singlestick? Oh, no. This came from my fight with Flashman. Well, Scud helped too. Flashy was much bigger, you see. Diggs refereed to make sure it was all according to London Rules."

He added the last part as if he expected me to protest a two-on-one fight. Clearly, he didn't know me very well.

"I told you not to ask," Misato said. The foreign boy had managed to rub her the wrong way back in the car, when he'd been horrified that the military allowed women in. I tried to change the subject.

"What's your home and family like?"

He gave me a puzzled look, as if nobody had ever asked him that before. Then he started talking very quickly and excitedly. I spent most of that time praying that he wouldn't remember his earlier offer to hit me with a wooden stick, so I only caught half of it--something about a giant chalk horse, a stone that whistled if you blew into it just right, and something called a "veast" that sounded a little bit like a Japanese festival. I guess it would have been interesting if I'd paid more attention.

"...and we're quite close to the place where William the Conqueror beat the Saxons--"

"Tom, he meant your home in the Angevin Union, not your ancestral home," Misato cut in.

"Actually, growing up in the third world country he just described would explain a lot," Ritsuko said.

"Shut up, Rits."

Misato's rebuke didn't carry much conviction, though.

"What do you mean, the Angevin Union?" Tom asked.

Misato sighed.

"I mean your home in France."

"France?!"

The boy spoke the word as if he was ready to gag. Misato suddenly whipped around and glared at him, eyes narrowed. Her happy-go-lucky mask dropped instantly.

"We're not stupid, Tom. We all know that most of England got submerged in Second Impact, so you can stop pretending. And don't ever -- _ever _-- joke about Second Impact in my presence again. Do you understand me?"

Tom looked back at her in stunned silence. The steel in her voice had been intimidating enough, but there was something else as well that I couldn't put my finger on.

"Y...yes ma'm," he said weakly. After she turned back around, he leaned against the boat's side and looked at a giant hand jutting out of the pink sea as the waves from our boat's wake lapped against it.

"_Submerged..._" he whispered.

"We're here," Ritsuko suddenly announced. We piled out of the boat and walked through a pair of metal doors. As soon as we were inside, the doors closed behind us and everything went black.

* * *

When the lights are off a mile underground, they're _off_. I turned in place--I didn't want to risk blundering off the catwalk--until I thought I was facing the direction my escorts had been standing.

"Who turned off the lights?" I shouted. In the darkness, I heard my voice bounce and echo around the room. It sounded a few octaves higher than I'd always thought it was. On the other hand, it wasn't half as squeaky as the scream I let out when the lights turned on again and I found myself standing face to face with a giant robot.

"Synthetic lifeform," Ritsuko corrected. "Mankind's ultimate weapon against the Angels."

"Begging your pardon, ma'am, but they're not angels," Tom said.

The doctor deflated a little and shot a _what the hell?_ look at Misato.

"Fundamentalist," Misato whispered.

"Aren't most Angevin citizens supposed to be secular these days?" Ritsuko asked.

"Not this one, evidently."

"Good thing you warned me before I mentioned my Angelic evolution theory."

Misato nodded. I took a few seconds to survey the room. Its dimensions were enormous--like a green metal cathedral dome, crisscrossed with walkways and railings.

"Evolution?" Tom said. "You mean like that Empedocles fellow, with his arms and legs and organs running around until they put themselves together?"

Ritsuko started to roll her eyes, stopped, and decided to stare instead.

"Wherever he came from, they're big on the Classics," Misato said.

"Ah."

A cold voice rang out from the platform above us. Ever since I was a child, I'd only been permitted to hear it distorted through the phone lines. It was so sharp and clear now that I almost didn't recognize it.

"It's been a while," my father said.

I hung my head and said nothing. This was all wrong. This wasn't how I'd fantasized seeing my father. Then again, even my fantasies hadn't been very hopeful. At least I didn't have to see his look of scorn when I stared at the floor.

"Prepare Unit 01. We have a pilot now," he said.

For a moment, I thought he meant Tom. Suddenly, all of his idiosyncrasies made sense. The violent sports...the fights...his regret that there weren't any Irish laborers on the roadside to attack with a peashooter...

Still, I felt a little sorry for the boy. He didn't know my father like I did. Father _used_ people, then spat them out again. Unfortunately, I hadn't been useful at four years old, so I'd been discarded early in the game.

...Which brought me to another issue.

"Why did you send for _me_?" I asked.

"Because you're the pilot of Unit 01, obviously," my father said. It was incredible how much scorn he managed to compress into those eight words.

"What?! Wait...Why me? Why now?" I shouted.

"There's nobody else."

"What about Tom? That's why you brought him here, isn't it? He plays Rugby football, for crying out loud. Let _him_ kill the Angel!"

"You think I'd choose _you_ if Tom's synch ratio was remotely close to functional?" he snapped. There it was. I hadn't thought it was possible to feel any smaller, but my father had found a way to do it. Stupidly, I wanted to scowl at the golden-haired little foreigner who'd just received praise at my expense. From my father. _My_ father.

I couldn't even work up the motivation to do that.

"How can you do this to me _now_, father?" It sounded pathetic, probably because it was.

He stood impassively behind the reflections in his bulletproof glass cage. I don't think he so much as twitched.

"The choice is simple," he said. "Get into the EVA or leave."

"This is insane, father! I can't do this! I have no idea how to pilot this thing!"

"You'll be instructed."

"That's not enough!"

"Then get out of my sight," he said. He hit an intercom button. "Medical team: I want Pilot Ayanami in here _now_."

"Get in the EVA, Shinji," Misato growled.

"I _can't_!"

"Ikari?" Tom said.

"What?!"

"Look here; it's a rum thing to ask you to do something I can't do myself, but that can't be helped. These creatures--"

"Angels," Ritsuko amended.

"--_creatures _want to kill us all. There are women here, for heaven's sake!"

Misato bristled behind him. I can only assume she let it go because she expected Tom's pleas to have any effect...which just goes to show how little she knew about me at that point.

"Can't you just _try_, Ikari?"

I imagined Tom dying in unpleasant ways. It didn't help, much.

"I'm not getting into that EVA," I said.

He gave me a hard look, then turned away and said nothing for the next few minutes.

* * *

Rei's entrance was a masterclass in emotional blackmail. Imagine, if you will, a hauntingly beautiful girl dressed in a skin-tight suit gasping in pain as she's wheeled in. Tom's eyes suddenly went wide, and he took a few paces back. Before he could say anything, a crash from the ceiling sent debris hurtling toward us. I screamed and uselessly covered my head, waiting for the blow to fall. It never did.

When I looked up again, I saw a huge pair of purple arms curled over me like a shield. A scream interrupted my thoughts before I could consider the implications of that fact. A few feet away, the girl had fallen from her stretcher and was pouring blood onto the floor.

Tom had finally found his voice again.

"Ikari, this is abominable! You can't intend to let this girl go in your place, surely? If you--"

"I'll do it!" I yelled.

Years later, someone asked me why I didn't see through the obvious manipulation and press my father for concessions while the iron was hot. I can only reply with this: Picture yourself as a scared, sexually frustrated fourteen year old boy, and then tell me what you would have done differently.

* * *

Asuka once told me that the entry plug is like a womb, with all of the comfort that this implies. I agree with her, except for one thing: I've never been comfortable with LCL. It's nasty, oily stuff that makes your skin feel like it's suffocating. As for getting it out of your system, imagine spending ten minutes coughing something up that tastes like blood.

"I feel sick," I grumbled.

"You're a boy, so act like one," Misato replied.

The entry plug erupted in light: first a rainbow, then bright red, then black-and-white rings. As soon as the plug returned to normal, I could feel the EVA's body moving along a conveyer belt. Then I realized that the EVA's body had become my own.

"Synchronization at 43%."

Someone--I think it was Ritsuko--shouted "Amazing!" in the background. For the first time, I wondered if I might make it out of this alive after all.

"Removing secondary lock bolts."

_No problem. No problem at all. Just keep focused on their commands..._

"Removing primary restraints."

_No problem...No problem..._

"Removing secondary restraints."

_No prob--_

"EVA launch!"

"GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!"


	3. The Ballad of East and West

**Chapter 2: Shinji**

An unfamiliar ceiling.

If I ever turn these notes into a proper biography, I think that's what I'll call it. I've seen a lot of unfamiliar ceilings in my life, and they've always seemed to be symbolic of something—though I'm not quite sure what. It was only after my battle with the Third Angel that I started to notice the pattern. Later, I would come to measure my life by the procession of beams, moldings, and wood panels above my hospital beds. For now, all I knew was that I was alone in a strange city in a strange house owned by a strange woman…

…In the same room as a very, very strange foreigner.

At the moment, Tom was kneeling beside his bed, hands propped on the mattress in a gesture of supplication. He explained its ritual significance to me later, but at the time it just creeped me out. I turned away from him and pulled the covers over my head.

My memories kept me company.

* * *

_Face down on the concrete. I can't move. My head throbs, even though I know intellectually that there's nothing wrong. There'll be something very wrong in a minute, though._

_My enemy stalks toward me. He's a nightmare of green sinews and protruding bones. If scarecrows were made of rotting corpses, he'd be the prototype. A hand wraps around my face and pulls me up to eye level. The next moment is blinding pain and white light. Something slams against my forehead with the force and repetitiveness of a battering ram. I scream and know my skull is going to crack. _

_But it's just neural feedback!_

_Doesn't matter._

_It's just my mind playing tricks on me!_

_Doesn't matter._

_IT'S NOT REAL!_

_Doesn't matter. _

_MAKE IT STOP! MAKE IT STOP! MAKE IT STOP!_

_Can't. _

_I'm ready to black out when a presence envelops me. It's equal parts warm, nurturing and bloodthirsty. The metal monster caresses me and asks me to give myself completely to it. And I do._

_Then, suddenly, it's as if I'm having the world's most powerful sugar rush._ _I __am__ the EVA now. My hand wrenches the Angel's wrist until it pops from its socket. My leg shoots out and kicks the creature across the darkened tunnel of buildings. I drive it far enough away that I can only see its flailing limbs in the green glow of my shoulder pylons. It's like watching a spider in its death throes by the light of a glo-stick._

_I--(or the EVA? Doesn't matter.) __We__ charge. We sink our dull teeth into the Angel's flesh and let its blood warm our throat. We grab its shoulders and ram our knee into its chest. We twist and snap its twiggy arms. We thrust it into the ground and beat and tear into it until it's far, far past dead. We beat it until—_

* * *

A muffled sob cut through the darkness of our room.

_That's right, Shinji. _I thought. _Cry in front of the little foreigner._ _Let him tell Father what a coward you are. A worthless, spineless little…_

_Wait…_

I wasn't crying. _He_ was.

The foreign boy was still on his knees, head bowed. He was clearly fighting to keep himself quiet—the only way that I could tell was that his golden curls bobbed up and down with each suppressed whimper. I wanted to roll over and leave the crazy kid alone, but I found that I couldn't. I don't think it was pity so much as morbid curiosity. Or maybe I'm being too generous with myself. Maybe it was just sadism.

_Where's Misato? Doesn't she hear this? Why can't she __deal__ with this?!_

I halfheartedly tried to roll over. The _swish _of the sheets must have caught Tom's attention, because he tensed and whirled around.

"I…er…I'm sorry, Ikari. Didn't mean to wake you."

_Why can't she make him leave? _I thought. _Or __me__ leave?_

"Um…It's ok," I said.

"J…just a bit under the—" he fought down a sniffle by clenching his hand against his thigh "—weather, that's all. I assure you it won't happen again."

"I don't mind," I said.

He stared at me with his brow furrowed and jaw a little slack, as if I'd done something very strange.

"Is…um…whatever you're doing making you sad?" I asked. It was more to stop him from staring at me than to start up a conversation, but I got one anyway. He stroked his chin.

"I suppose so," he said at last. "After a fashion, anyway. I…never prayed at Rugby. I left off praying when the other boys teased me about it…but I always used to pray when I was home, d'ye see?"

He sighed.

"No, I don't suppose you could, exactly," he said. "Do heathens pray?"

He probably mistook my look of puzzlement for anger, since he started talking very quickly.

"Oh! I mean to say—well, don't misunderstand me. I don't mean it like _that_. Like an insult, I mean. It's just…hem…yes, well."

He dropped his gaze and tapped his forefinger along the ridges of his left hand, as if he was counting.

"Er…OK?" I said.

A long silence followed. My eyes adjusted to the moonlight, and I noticed that he was staring at the floor. I figured that was my signal to leave him alone, so I rolled over and hoped that my job was done for the night.

"Ikari?"

_Aw, crap._

"Yes?"

"Do you ever, ah, think about your mother? If you don't mind my asking, that is."

"Mom died when I was two," I said. I made it as deadpan as I could. That should shut him up for a while.

"Oh, dear. I'm so sorry."

"Yeah, well, nothing you could do about it," I said.

"I suppose not. Still…"

I didn't bother responding after he trailed off.

_Just leave me alone_.

"Well, I won't wake you again, Ikari. My…display tonight was unseemly. I'm sorry."

I shrugged. He mumbled something in English for a few minutes and then crawled into bed. He didn't cry again for a very long time.

* * *

"_Are you the EVA pilot? Y/N"_

I looked behind me and saw a brown-haired girl in the back giggling. When her eyes met mine, she gave me a low-key wave. School in Tokyo-3 was everything I'd expected it to be: dull, stressful, and filled with social pitfalls. It didn't help that my two best "friends" were bigger social pariahs than I was. Rei spent most of her time staring absently out the window, confining her conversation to monosyllables. Tom _wanted_ to communicate, but being a foreigner made things difficult—along with the fact that he only spoke 19th century Japanese for some reason.

_I guess it can't spoil my reputation any __more__, _I thought.

I hit "yes". The room exploded with female chatter, and I was surrounded by a wall of blue skirts and breathless questions.

"What'sitlikeTellusaboutitWhydoyoupilotDidyouhavetoqualifyforitWasitscaryWhatwastheangellike?"

Even though it felt like getting blasted on all sides with radio chatter cranked up to eleven, I can't say that the attention was unpleasant.

…Until after school.

"Hey new kid!"

It was the big guy in the track suit who sat at the back of the room. Toji something-or-other. He scowled as he approached, stepping hard enough on the gravel that I could hear it crunch.

_I mustn't run…_

WHAM!

Pain lanced through my cheek. My legs sank under me like wet noodles and I flopped onto the ground, skinning my arms in the process. In front of me, I watched the spinning image of my attacker as he cracked his knuckles.

"Sorry, kid. Had to take my anger out on _somebody_, ya know?"

He smirked and headed back to the door. Something warm and wet dribbled down my chin. Great. My lip was bleeding. And of course, I 'd have to explain it to Misato. Something glinted on the edge of my field of vision. I rubbed my head and followed the light to a pair of glasses attached to an impish, freckled face. His hair reminded me of Tom's.

"Toji's kinda rude like that," Kensuke said. "Still, you _did_ hurt his sister…"

"I didn't want to pilot in the first place!" I shouted.

Toji suddenly stopped, stomped back over to me, and yanked me into a standing position by my shirt collar. He cocked his fist again. I looked away.

"I shouldn't do that if I were you."

Toji's hold slackened and I felt him turn around.

"Stay out of this, _gaijin_-boy," he said.

"Let Ikari go or I'll give you a sound thrashing."

Toji's hand opened and he shoved me backwards with his palm. My legs stumbled desperately to keep up with my falling upper body, but it wasn't any use. I fell down again.

"What's your name again, kid?"

"Tom Brown."

"Well Tom, I'm going to enjoy kicking your ass," Toji said. They were standing almost nose to nose now, and I realized that they were actually closer in size than I'd thought. The foreign kid was smaller, but not by much. Tom smiled and sank into something that looked similar to a boxing stance, except that he kept cycling his arms back and forth as if they were pedaling a bicycle. Toji snorted.

"You've gotta be kidding."

He pulled his right fist back and made a grab at Tom's shirt with his left. Almost lazily, Tom simultaneously batted Toji's hand away with his forearm and thrust his own left hand into Toji's face. It was different from any punch I'd seen before—more like a fencing lunge than a jab. His fist connected with Toji's nose and planted my former tormenter on the seat of his pants.

"Son of a…"

Toji jumped up and assumed a stance of his own. He'd obviously had some boxing experience as well—he moved in more deliberately now, weaving his upper body to make his head a moving target. Tom jerked as if he was going to throw his left again, then slammed a straight right hand into Toji's nearer ribs. Toji countered with a swinging left that caught Tom on the forehead. Both staggered back a couple paces.

"Didn't they teach you to keep your hands up where you come from, dumbass?" Toji said.

Tom steadied himself and then nodded at Toji's bruised hand.

"That's what you get for trying a rounding blow when a straight one would have worked better," he said.

Toji moved in again, flicking a jab out a few times to find his range. By now, both were in brawling mode—Toji was no longer bobbing and weaving, and Tom's arms had stopped moving.

Toji lurched forward with his right. Tom deflected it upwards with the same weird-looking forearm block. As soon as Toji's punch had sailed over his head, Tom rotated his blocking arm until the knuckles faced Toji's face and brought it down between his opponent's eyes. His knuckles broke the skin as they were dragged across it, and blood started to ooze onto Toji's eyebrows.

"You won't be able to see in half a minute," Tom said. "I suggest you call it quits."

Toji wiped the blood out of his eyes and spat a red glob of saliva at Tom's feet. Then he rushed in again and tried to throw an uppercut. He'd probably intended to close the range to prevent Tom from timing him on the outside. As it turned out, that was a bad idea. Tom leaned away from the uppercut and then grabbed his crouching opponent around the neck with one hand while he pummeled his ribs with the other. Toji tried to bull him forward, but Tom kept leaning on him until Toji sank to his knees. As soon as that happened, Tom stopped throwing punches and backed away.

"Is it settled, then?"

Toji glared back defiantly and stood up.

"So you want to fight dirty, huh?" he said.

"I'm not sure what you—Argh!"

Toji swung his leg around like a baseball bat. His shin connected with Tom's outer thigh, nearly buckling his leg. Tom skipped gingerly away on his remaining leg.

"So that's the way you fight here, is it?" he yelled. "Kicking like Frenchmen?"

"You are a Frenchman, you idiot."

"YAAAAAARRRGGGHH!"

I've heard many primal screams during my time in Tokyo 3. Tom's was among the loudest. He closed the distance before Toji had time to react, backing his opponent up with lefts and rights. Toji was too surprised to sidestep, and soon they were within grappling range. Tom whipped an arm around Toji's neck, turned his back to him, and threw him headfirst over his hip. They collapsed into a heap, Tom uppermost.

"_Now_ do you give in, you blackguard?"

"Whu---huh?"

"I _said_, do you give in?"

Instead of answering, Toji shook his head a few times to clear it. Tom shrugged and started pushing himself into a standing position. And then…

"No, I _don't_!"

Toji swiveled his hips to the side and snaked his legs around Tom's straightened arm. Tom tried to pull back, but Toji yanked the arm against the inside of his own leg.

"Do _you_ give in?"

"I'll do no such thing! I'll—aah!"

Toji kept pulling. I wondered how long Tom's tendons would hold out.

"Suzuhara, let go of Brown."

Everybody stopped. Toji tried to meet the glare of Rei's single unbandaged eye. He lasted maybe a second and a half before looking away.

"Stay out of this," he mumbled.

Rei's facial expression didn't change an iota.

"I remind you that Tom and Shinji are both essential components of humanity's defense system. NERV would treat any attempt to damage them…unfavorably."

Toji let go of Tom's arm and fell onto his back. Tom slumped next to him. Both were panting heavily.

"I would've had you if the albino hadn't saved you," Toji gasped.

"If I'd known you'd fight on the ground like a dog, I wouldn't have followed you down," Tom replied equally breathlessly.

"Hey, that's Judo you're talking about," Toji said. "Don't diss our national sport."

"Then your national sport is stupid," Tom replied.

"Wanna have another round?" Toji growled.

"Delighted."

"That will not be possible," Rei said. "An Angel is approaching."


End file.
